Everybody Was Gladius Fighting
by KassiopeiaBlue
Summary: Leo asks Reyna to help him with his fighting, (because Reyna is the perfect teacher, obvz) but Leo's self-esteem soon plummets to below-negative levels when he learns that he's even worse at it than he thought. (Mild language: Hell and Hades, Words: 1244)


**everybody was gladius fighting**

by kassiopeiablue

The first training session was the worst. The weather was humid, and every time Leo picked up the sword, his arms ached. He was sure that he wasn't _that_ weak, but it seemed that everything he was with Reyna, he was proved wrong.

"If, Valdez," Her lips curved downwards in a face of disapproval. "Perhaps we shouldn't be training."

Leo's eyebrows furrowed. He was determined to prove himself to her. He braved the pain and picked up the sword once again, holding it high above his head.

"Are you trying to _kill me_, Valdez?" she questioned, pulling the sword back to chest level, her deep brown eyes shown and sparkled under the beading sun as she looked straight towards him. Leo sighed. It's not like he was training because he wanted to see her – that was just a plus. No, it was tired of being Leo, 'the boy on fire'. He wanted to be Leo, 'super hero extraordinaire who is super helpful and stuff.' The title was a work-in-progress.

"Alright, Leo, now first thing's first, we have to work on handling the sword." She said, keeping the sword steady with him. The sword wobbled a bit, but when Reyna let go and stepped in front of him, he still kept in position. It was a little lighter now.

"Wooooo!" Leo shouted, lunging his sword a little in front of him. Reyna smiled, and them yelped and paint. Leo had poked Reyna with the sharp, pointed edge of his training gladius. There was a scar about 3 inches on near her hand.

"This _training _session is over," she concluded, eye twitching with pain.

"See you tomorrow?" He said weakly. She waved him off with her other, uninjured hand and walked towards a medic. Some Roman clapped him on the back and told him, 'good job'.

The sessions that followed the first one were slightly less bad. Out of the next four one-day sessions, Reyna was only injured on two of them, and they were all minor.

Leo had practiced on his sword-holding stances, but that was about it. The sword was still painful too lift, and his arm was always still sore from the last session.

After the 4th day, Reyna sat down on the ground, exhausted.

"I'm not sure I can do anything to help you, Leo," she said. It was one of the first times she called him by his first name. A twinge of sadness pecked at his heart. She felt bad for him. Hell, he felt bad for himself. "I think you'd benefit more from a different teacher. Maybe I'm just not the right person to –"

Leo gripped Reyna's hand, and she glared at him with annoyance. "Even if I do have to get another teacher, Reyna, just now that it's me, not you, that's causing problems." He let go of her hand, and they both started to blush.

Reyna sighed and sat back up. The weather on that day was nice, with a cool breeze sweeping through the Camp.

"What are you doing on the floor, Valdez? We've got some training to do," She snatched her sword out of her holster. Leo scrambled up and picked his gladius off of the floor, holding his stance rigidly. His sword, however, shook nervously. "You up for a little fight?"

Reyna was superior to Leo fighting-wise in every way. Hell, _everyone_ was superior to Leo in terms of fighting. Even his tía, Rosa, was a better fighter than he was. At least she had her weight. Now she wanted to fight him? It was a bad idea.

"Uh – not really –" Leo said nervously. "But if you say so, Reyna –"

Without warning, she lunged at his exposed stomach. In a rare moment of foresight, he jumped out of the way.

"What the Hades, Reyna?" he yelled. "You _know_ I don't know anything about swordfighting?"

"Just focus, Leo," she yelled back, lunging for his also exposed elbow. He yelped in pain and his sword clattered to the ground.

"Are you okay?" She cocked her head to the side. He was so stiff and leader-y (which was usually the opposite of what Leo liked in a girl) but then there were those times when she really cared.

So of course he had a crush on her.

"I'm fine," Leo regained his composure and got back into the stance. She got back into her fighting stance, as well, and she swayed back and forth like you see in movies. Leo lunged weakly at Reyna, and she poked it aside like it was nothing.

After a few more rounds of their pointless fighting, Reyna gave up.

"I think that's it for today. I've got my praetor duties…" Her voice trailed off. "I think that after tomorrow, you should get someone else to help you."

"I understand, Reyna." He watched her figure retreat into the distance. Now, there was no possible way for him to improve enough for Reyna to want to teach him; but maybe, just maybe, if he got before tonight and tomorrow, he'd be good enough.

He tried to swing the sword. He tried to swivel it. It was too heavy for him to do anything graceful, so all of his strokes were sloppy and blunt.

He spent hours just trying. Some of the campers that walked by shot him a pitying gaze. He must have looked pathetic. He felt pathetic.

The more he tried, he more his body temperature rose. He was angry. Angry at how weak he was, angry at the pity everyone felt for him and most of all he was angry at how Reyna saw him. He didn't want anyone have seen him like this, especially not Reyna, main praetor of Camp Jupiter.

He threw his wretched sword to the ground and his lit his arm ablaze. The flaming red and gold ringlets circled his hand like little wisps. His breath was rapid and heavy. The fire never made him feel powerful, but that day it did. Actually Leo had never felt powerful from anything. He'd always had low self-esteem, and even with his knew group of friends, his brain was filled with self-deprecated thoughts about being the 'seventh wheel'.

Suddenly he had an idea.

His arm still on fire, he picked up the scratched gladius. It felt about 30 pounds lighter and it was much easier to maneuver. He swiveled the sword, he lunged with the sword, he did _everything he could _with the sword. Each move he tried made his heart swell with pride. Now he was Leo, _the not so useless loser. _He had to practice all night perfecting his moves on his own.

When he thought about it, it actually made a lot of sense. There was one story that the Hermes kids were passing around. When Percy first got to camp, he sucked at sword fighting until they were playing capture the flag. The Ares kids pushed him in a river in the forest, and he showed them his awesome Greek skillz.

Leo grinned and danced manically. He looked crazy, dancing around with a sword and a fiery arm. But he didn't care. The people who saw him didn't matter, and they probably could never imagine what he was going through, with their haughty Roman gazes and their superior Roman skills. But at his next swordfighting lesson, Reyna would be in for a huge surprise.


End file.
